RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas — What was for a decade the top spot on the southern border for illegal immigration has shifted to other parts of the 2,000-mile boundary, largely driven by the threat of deportation and hostile human smugglers in the region.

The most-southern tip of the United States, the Rio Grande Valley of southeast Texas, has led all other nine southern border regions in immigrant arrests since 2013, but escalating cartel violence in Mexico and the United States sending back immigrants who cross into the region have been the driving forces behind immigrants rethinking where to cross, according to government and union officials.

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